Advantages

Disadvantages

Well worth the money and lots of space.

I purchased my Fridge/Freezer approx 4 years ago. I chose it for several reasons, these being it was a well known make, it came in silver (as well as white) and it was half fridge, half freezer.

When I was looking around at the time it seemed that a lot of fr/fr were 2/3rds fridge, 1/3rd freezer or the other way around, only came in white and to be perfectly honest some looked absolutely awful design wise.So when I stumbled across this one I was so pleased to find it was silver, half and half as well as frost free!!

The first thing that then crossed my mind was oh I bet it doesnt have a well designed interior or there are gonna be loads of compartments that I just wont need. How wrong I was!

Firstly, looking at it, it has a small digital display above the fridge door with 4 buttons next to it - zone, set temp ,save and fast freeze. Press zone and it will tell you the temperature of the fridge and freezer. Set temp allows you to set the temperature for the fridge (the freezer is automatically temp controlled) which should be between 2c and 6c, then press save. Fast freeze obviously does what it says!The good thing about this display is that it warns you if the freezer compartment temperature is affected by high temperature by way of an arrow in the display. I have never had any problems with this and I thought that I would never notice the display or look at it but I do.It also has adjustable front feet. It comes with a special spanner to adjust them. I thought this was a bit tricky but as you can adjust it whilst the fr/fr is in place it makes it easier. Tip : The easiest way to tell that its level is that when you open the door it stays in that position and doesn't swing shut on its own). Both doors are fully reversible as standard.

Now to the inside - 2 glass shelves, which I like as I can see whats at the back by looking through the shelf above rather than moving everything, lazy I know! Underneath the shelves are the 2 see-through salad bins. Each bin has an individual sliding vent to control the humidity. Underneath this is a chiller tray. This chiller tray maintains cold temperatures and is ideal for storing meat, fish chicken etc. I like this feature because if your fridge door is opened quite often the food in the chiller tray is not affected by the warmer air.

The door contains 4 moveable compartments at various heights, one of which is the usual egg holder. I store bottles of salad cream, mayo etc in one of mine, cheeses in another and chocolate in the top one on the rare occasion we have some!! The bottle rack is the best feature of all on this simply because its wide and you can store a 2L bottle of milk depthways, not something a lot of fridges do. I can get 2x 2L of milk, 1 x 1L and a 1.5L bottle of water in the door.

The freezer has 4 compartments, 3 with see through drop down doors and 1 tray at the bottom. Nice and deep and things and even though things often 'disappear' to the back the see through drawers allow you spot the box/carton that you are looking for. They plastic doors themselves have had a fair amount of handling and abuse over the last few years but I have had no problems such as them cracking or the catches breaking etc. The freezer temp runs between -18c to -22c.

It is easy to clean, just wipe the inside and outside down with a damp cloth.The interior light is placed on the left hand side at the front and therefore its not easy to block any light with items.

Frozen food storage Capacity is 28kgFreezing capacity in 24hrs is 12kgMax conservation time from failure is 14hrs.

The lovliest thing is its frost free, and for all us ladies, thats a dream. Gone are the days of the tea towel along the bottom, scraper in a hand that was frozen itself!, trying to defrost the freezer as quick as poss so the frozen food you stored in the fridge doesn't start to defrost!

The only 'con' about this is that when it defrosts itself, which is regularly, it can be quite noisy. The frost free cooling surfaces are hidden from view and the cold air is circulated by a fan to ensure that a even temperature and rapid cooling systemm is maintained. Sometimes the appliance makes a 'popping' sound similar to the noise an icecube makes when it first goes in liquid. At first I noticed it a lot but, like most things, you get used to it and now I don't notice it at all.

Another point to make is that the front of the cabinet sometimes feels warm but this is part of the 'refridgerant circulating system' which prevents condensation on the door seal and its perfectly normal.

I paid £279.00 for mine which I thought was reasonable considering anything that comes in anything apart from white normally has the price hiked up.

Hotpoint have the usual 12 month parts and labour guaranteee but the parts are guaranteed for 5 years. The only snag is that should a part need replacing that you can't do yourself you have to have them fitted by one of their Service Engineers and you still pay a labour charge.

Overall this is a great Fridge Freezer and touch wood has never let me down.

So there'll be no snow in my house! Thanks for reading and I hope my opinion might help someone.